Tuesday, December 24, 2013

India and the Khobragade Saga...

Devyani Khobragade, the Indian consular official arrested two weeks ago by American officials on charges of visa fraud and labor law violations relating to her employment of a nanny/housekeeper, has stirred an international affair with Indian outrage drawing demonstrations against the US government and the New York officials who arrested her.

The attractive 39-year-old Khobragade, rather than being a member of the elite foreign service, according to the narrative, is a dalit, a member of India’s lowest caste, once called “untouchables,” who apparently managed to pull herself up by her own bootstraps to become a member of an exclusive foreign service brigade. She is married to a New York-born American Indian who is described as an oenophile – a wine connoisseur.

But amid the swirl of charges of mistreatment of a diplomat, of high-handedness of US officials against a lesser country are the charges laid against Khobragade by Sangeeta Richard, the housemaid she employed.

Media in Mumbai say that Richard’s husband, Philip, in a petition to the New Delhi High Court in July, listed these charges against Khobragade, describing her as keeping his wife in “slavery-like conditions or keeping a person in bondage.” Full story...

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